The Holy Terror [and] The Blackboard Jungle

Kansas City MO: The Play House. Near Fine. (c.1965). Unstated edition. Stapled wraps. [moderate wear along spine, very slight dog-earing at upper right corner]. (B&W photographs) The "complete texts of two new plays," presented in a format designed for schools and/or small theatre companies, and pitched as "suited to your actors and staging conditions." (This copy had actually been mailed to a high school in Madera, California.) The center pages of the volume advertise various other plays offered by the company, as well as their services, which included a "Production Book" containing a director's guide, a prompt script, etc., "a complete blueprint for producing the play." The two plays presented here are "The Holy Terror," a drama about Florence Nightingale which had originally been presented on TV under the "Hallmark Hall of Fame" banner in April 1965 (with Julie Harris in the lead), and "The Blackboard Jungle," the high-school-hoodlum drama that had been filmed by MGM in 1955, based on the Evan Hunter novel. (The book contains a single photograph from each of these productions.) These adaptations seems to have been specifically written for the amateur theatrical market; I can find no evidence that either one was ever given a major professional staging. .